Updated on
Wednesday, May 14

OMG: Have you lived in a rental property owned by Domus, KW4Rent or a similar company? Imprint is looking into student complaints/feedback about popular rental housing companies in Waterloo that often target students. If you or someone you know has lived in a house owned by one of the bigger rental companies and are willing to share your experience (good or bad) with a reporter, please email news@imprint.uwaterloo.ca

I had a horrible experience renting with an individual person, but amazing experiences with big companies. The thing is to go with big companies, but not the ones that target students. The ones that target students don't give a fuck because they can generally get away with shit, but in my experience the normal big companies (that target regular people) are more likely to follow all the rule to avoid getting sued.

I lived with Schembri for a year, never again. Although the building was new, the heating was iffy and the toilet broke. The original property manager would rarely answer his phone, stood me up for a meeting once I signed the lease and didn't cash my deposit check on time so I had to give him another one before I could even get in the place. When I came back from coop for the winter, he was fired. Rumor was that he was subletting students rooms during the summer without their knowledge and pocketing the cash.

The next guy wasn't much better, to be honest. And I felt like the rent was way too expensive for a unfurnished small room with no amenities in the building.

I have been with Divine Property Management for the past two years and I'm quite satisfied with them. We had a roof leak once and the owners answered our call right away and sent someone over to take a look and fix it. In addition, the always answer my call or e-mail within a day if I have any concerns. I pay around $500 for my room but utilities aren't included.

I have been with KW4Rent for about 2 years now , I haven't had any bad experiences from them, well maybe except the heating. They have a certain threshold for certain temperatures so when its cold and we turn up the heat it doesn't get any warmer. But that doesn't last very long.

The people are nice, they send reminder emails for rent due dates, lease terminations, and they indicate if they are going to charge you extra for late fees. They send emails if they are going to visit your suite within a couple of days.

Their response time to come and fix stuff is about a week. All you have to do is go to the front desk and tell them your problems, they write it down. And someone will come fix it. Sometimes its within a couple of days other times its a week or more.

The rooms are reasonable size with good and comfortable furniture. They are reasonable with moving out and moving in. Im paying in about $570 (fully furnished, and internet) Hydro is separate. I would say thats pretty good considering, its right on Lester. Oh and they let you carry forward the price you had when you originally leased with them.

So thats been my experience with them so far, very pleasant. Hopefully it continues like this, till my lease ends.

I am currently with Domus and I can tell you they are terrible. They are completely unreliable and are a ripoff with their false advertisements. When we first moved in they told us that all their houses are professionally cleaned prior to new leasers. We arrived at our house to find dust, stains, dead bugs, and grime everywhere with no light bulbs at all. Not to mention of the two bathrooms we have one shower is completely unusable due to the filth, lack of warm (not even hot) water, and broken shower door. All of the sinks are clogged and no matter how much we try to fix it water never goes down well. One of our toilets leaks to the point that there is a water mark on the ceiling below. We had contacted Domus about this problem right in the beginning of our lease and repeatedly sent emails only to get a reply that they are busy. We finally got a response of acknowledgment on the last month of our one year lease. Not to mention we got fined for having a barbeque in front of our door due to it being a fire hazard. But guess what? The barbeque belongs to Domus and is chained to our patio so we can't even remove it. Lastly I'm pretty sure this is against some rule or privacy right but we have decided not to renew the lease so there has been house showings. I have read somewhere that they must give at least 24hrs notice before a viewing. This almost never happens, they walk in as they please. We've gotten emails to notify us about a viewing a couple hours before they arrived only to get a warning email after about how the common areas are untidy and they may have to charge us because they were going to send in a professional cleaning team to clean up our mess.Overall, I don't ever plan to go with Domus ever again they are completely unreliable for maintenance and I'm pretty sure they are breaking a few rules.

Also with Domus this term, very similar problems! Lease had a dishwasher in it, none to be found in the house. After three months of emails they sent a portable one. The stove has 1 reliable element and 1 that works about half the time, the other 2 don't work at all. Never given keys to two of the rooms, picked the locks with a credit card to get in and never locked again. One of the lights doesn't have a switch, if a new bulb is put it, it stays on until it burns out. One room doesn't have baseboards, and there are holes in the wall in the stairs where it looks like a railing was ripped out. We get emails for viewing at ~1am for noon the next day...Don't go with Domus.

I've rented with WOCH once. They're not too different from the other major student rental companies. Hot water ran out fast, maintenance was poor, house was dirty prior to moving in, and the rooms were expensive for their size. They did however respond to emails pretty fast and answered my questions.

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